Building Business Indians Pass On Chickee Tradition.

June 21, 1992|By LYN REX, Special to the Sun-Sentinel and BOB FRENCH, Staff Writer

Chickees are more than ancestral homes for the Seminole Indians.

The thatched-roof houses are also big business for tribal members, who make open-sided chickees for people looking to add a tropical flair to their yards and gardens.

``Mother Earth gives us all the ingredients we need to build the huts,`` said Joe Dan Osceola, a member of the Seminole Indian Tribe near Hollywood.

But getting the palm leaves and cypress poles for an authentic chickee can be a grueling task. The trees are cut down in the Big Cypress Swamp, where workers have to watch out for water moccasins. The palm leaves come from the Brighton Seminole Indian Reservation, where rattlesnakes are a hazard.

Osceola`s family has built chickees for generations. Traditionally, they were used by the tribe for shelters in the Everglades, serving as sleeping, cooking and meeting rooms.

``I lived in one on Brighton Reservation until modern housing came in the `50s,`` Osceola said. ``Houses have more privacy. Chickees have the cross breezes.``

But more recently, chickee building has provided a business for many Seminole and Miccosukee families.

``I`d like my son Victor to know how to build, but also go on to school, maybe become an artist. He could help me build on the side,`` said Vince Osceola, Joe Dan Osceola`s nephew.

On the Hollywood reservation, there are about twelve crews that build chickees.

``Every family passes along this tradition on the Miccosukee and Brighton reservations along with the language,`` said Wade Osceola, Joe Dan Osceola`s son. ``We`re more modern in Hollywood -- not everyone learns. It`s better to pass on the tradition.``

Cypress logs, stripped and smoothed, provide the pillars that hold up the chickee`s roof. Tree branches are shaped into the roof`s frame, which is then covered by palm fronds. The tightly woven fronds make the roof rain proof.

About 600 to 700 palm fronds are needed for the roof of an 11-foot-by-14-foot chickee. Its frame consists of about 10 cypress poles.

Small chickees take a day or two to build. Bigger shelters can take weeks.

The cypress logs last fifteen to twenty years. The roofs need to be rethatched after six or seven years.

``I`m always looking for ways to build a new variation of a hut,`` Joe Dan Osceola said. ``Everything is hand fitted. No two trees grow alike and no two chickees will ever be alike.``